Konoha's Greatest Hoax
by Lucillia
Summary: When something completely unpredictable that could end up destroying any number of plans and land two of them into serious trouble happens, three shinobi end up faking one of the most significant events in Konoha's history.


As the Sandaime Hokage had learned when the library had decided to follow that unfortunate Chunin home, Naruto and Sealing Ink didn't mix. So, when Naruto had followed that old Uzumaki recipe for homemade paint that he'd found on a scroll that he'd fished from a box that had been marked "Free to anybody who isn't Naruto.", it was inevitable that disaster would result...

As he made his way out of the Uchiha district in order to arrive at the rendezvous point where he'd be meeting Madara on time, Itachi found himself suppressing a smile despite the grim task that lay ahead of him that evening. The reason for the smile that was threatening to cross Itachi's face was a small blond who was happily graffitiing the buildings of the Uchiha district with careless abandon while the inhabitants watched in impotent fury, unable to do anything about it for fear of bringing the wrath of the Hokage - or worse, a mob of villagers who were convinced they were trying to free the Kyuubi in order to stage another attack - down on their heads. Sure, the Uzumaki brat would have to clean the mess up later, but watching him run wild now was fun for him if not for everyone else in the clan who would just view it as yet another slight against them, and he needed to save up these precious moments because there would be so few of them in the future, considering...

As Itachi and his companion who didn't seem as eager as he'd expected considering the negotiations he'd gone through to spare Konoha approached the Uchiha district in order to get down to the business of slaughtering their clan an hour later, there was an orange flash and the faint pop-tinkle noise that an incandescent lightbulb makes when it burns out. As they cautiously made their way into the district in order to investigate this odd phenomenon, Itachi idly noted that Naruto's graffiti had been cleaned up. He didn't know who could have done it though, considering the fact that there was nobody there. The entire Uchiha district had been completely emptied since he'd left to meet Madara, and looked to have done so in a hurry since there was food on the tables, and a half prepared batch of senbei in Uruchi's shop.

"So, what now?" Madara asked when they found after an exceedingly thorough search that every section of the district was indeed empty and that the Uchiha escape tunnels looked decidedly unused.

"Well..." Itachi started, before he realized that Madara wouldn't want to hear of his plan to go to the Hokage and explain the situation, considering.

"We wait for them to come back?" he finished lamely, knowing that that wait could end up being a very long and ultimately futile one since the Uchiha had a number of boltholes and hideaways scattered across the continent, and that the best he could hope for would be to make good his getaway before the Hokage and his council of Advisors twigged on to the fact that he'd failed his mission, and decided to accuse him of turning traitor since he was obviously the only one who could have informed the clan of their plans.

Maybe if he showed that he was making an effort when he and Madara finally caught up with their AWOL clan...

"Fine, but I'm not waiting for more than an hour." Madara said as he seated himself on a nearby stoop, crossed his arms, stretched out his legs, crossed them at the ankles, and started twitching his right foot impatiently.

An hour later, the clan failed to appear. Several people who'd come to investigate the odd orange light did though, and they were promptly rendered unconscious for their troubles.

"Madara's going to be so pissed when he fi-... Uh, er, Multiple Personality?" Madara said as he nervously rubbed the back of his head when the hour finally passed and both of them were yet again left with the question of "Alright, so what do we do now?"

Frankly, it didn't surprise Itachi one bit. Multiple Personality Disorder would explain a great deal about Madara, especially his actions towards the end before he went and decided to control the world from the background.

"We could..." Itachi started as an insane plan that might work as a stopgap measure began to form in his mind.

"Never mind, we'd need a couple hundred corpses of both genders and varying ages." he said, when he ran into the part where the plan would entirely fall apart.

"We could what?" Madara asked.

"Well, we could sort of fake the Massacre so Konoha doesn't go investigating what happened while we hunt the clan down. It's not like they'll show their faces in the village considering the fact that they obviously got wind of what's happening and scattered. Unfortunately, we'd need a couple hundred corpses for that, and we couldn't get those in time without someone noticing, even if we limited ourselves to Konoha's homeless population." Itachi said, pointing out how the plan was impossible.

"Do you remember that disaster that happened in Tea Country last year?" Madara asked.

"The one where that industrial accident released that cloud of poison gas that killed thousands?" Itachi asked. "And people wonder why we put certain limits on technology..."

"I may have run into a town that got overlooked by disaster response team. I meant to bury them, but well, I never got around to it." Madara said, sounding slightly sheepish.

"You don't seriously have...?" Itachi started, looking surprised.

"Uh, huh." Madara said as he pulled a large scroll that really shouldn't have been stored where it had been considering the risk of explosion when a storage seal hit a space expansion seal out of one of his shuriken pouches.

"So, we have the bodies, but..." Itachi said, before his plan hit another snag.

"But what?" Madara asked.

"Well, we Uchiha might all look alike to most of the villagers, but someone's going to notice." Itachi replied. "If we had a medic-nin who was skilled in certain surgical techniques, maybe...But, where are we going to find a surgeon who won't be missed at this time of night?"

"You know, I came by to see why the Uchiha district was so quiet, especially after that odd phenomenon that they would usually be up in arms about, and couldn't help overhearing your plight." a voice said from the darkness.

An instant later, a gray haired boy in glasses dropped from the roof of a nearby building and landed between Itachi and Madara twirling a scalpel in his left hand as he did so.

"You're a medic?" Itachi asked the boy who couldn't have been more than a year or two older than him, which usually translated to several years behind him in all levels of skill.

"Yep, one of Orochimaru's finest." the boy sad with an unsettling smile.

"And, why would you be willing to do this for us?" Itachi asked.

"It won't be out of the kindness of my heart, I assure you." the boy said. "I just thought that it'd be an excellent prank to pull on Danzo."

"What makes you think...?" Itachi started.

"Please don't insult my intelligence," the boy replied. "I used to work for the old bastard, and the disposal of the Uchiha clan has his fingerprints all over it."

An hour later, Itachi had been laying his "father's" corpse out in a suitably dramatic position when he heard screaming.

"Oh, shit. Sasuke!"

**Ten years later:**

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN DEAD?!" Uchiha Fugaku yelled from his spot on the vast lawn of the newly completed Fourth Shinobi World War Memorial Park where his house used to be located.

"Well, you see old man, it's like this..." a rather embarrassed looking Rokudaime Hokage said as he rubbed the back of his spiky blond head.


End file.
